Bantamweight champion Aljamain Sterling called out what he perceives to be a lack of respect from Dana White this week after casting doubt on an announced fight with Sean O’Malley in August and now the UFC head honcho has responded.
“I’m not the one that went out and said, ‘If my body holds up,’ when I’m promoting a fight. If you’re not healthy, don’t take the fight,” White said of Sterling in an interview with Amy Kaplan.
“We’ll have somebody else fight, we’ll do somebody else for the interim title. Don’t say you’re going to go out and fight and then start saying stuff like, ‘If my [body holds up].’
“What’s the first thing that happened? As soon as I was at the press conference, I was asked, ‘Is Aljamain Sterling really going to fight or not?’ Is that what you want the fans thinking? How is that me not giving him credit?”
Meanwhile, Sterling is also engaging in a war of words with his expected opponent Sean O’Malley too after being criticized by him for wavering on what is as it stands a fight that’s only been verbally but not contractually agreed.
“You have four months [to get ready] … take two months off, heal up, and then train hard for two months. It ain’t f****** science, or is it?” O’Malley stated after Sterling cast doubt on whether he’d be healthy in time to fight him or not.
“First off, it’s not science you freaking numb-nut moron. It’s called math,” Sterling retaliated in a video post. “Mathematics. You probably forgot because you might have dropped out of high school, or maybe you smoked all your brains away and you completely just forgot the difference between science and mathematics when you’re dealing with numbers. You know the big numbers that I like to make when I cash out for whooping that ass.
“As I said, I’m going to show up Aug. 19, not because of you, not because of the fans, I’m showing up because Dana [White] is cutting the check for Aug. 19. Other than that, you call no shots, I call no shots, so let’s stop pretending all this other nonsense. What’s this going to be, 97 days [between fights]? Last time I checked I thought that was three months, not four, but, I mean, maybe it’s science. Maybe there’s something to this. Maybe the way you do your math is completely different from me, but I’m going to take the time off, heal up. Obviously I had the discipline to become a champion.”
O’Malley also suggested that Sterling should be more active as a champion, noting that Israel Adesanya did so four times in the space of 12 months.
However, it’s worth noting that Sterling has actually defended his three times in 13 months, which makes him one of the more active current champions, and meanwhile he’s also eager to point out that O’Malley has actually been competing far less than he has.
“Like you said, [Israel Adesanya] has fought four times a year — how many times did you fight in the last year?” Sterling said. “Wait, oh wait, Abu Dhabi, Oct. 22, we both fought on the same card. I fought three times in 13 months. You fought I think once. Wow, that’s impressive, bro.
“Wow. I want to be just like you when I grow up. High all the time, talk like this and beat all these guys in the top 5 [rankings] that are still currently in the UFC. Dude, you’re such a freaking badass! You’re so freaking awesome. Isn’t Sean awesome?”
